https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/Titans-of-Industrial-Agriculture-by-Jennifer-Clapp/9780262551700?srsltid=AfmBOopELSc1sCbVc8BajGMmXPpPpwRIL4ba6xLH1gF2mlgFx1GcLgH0For the second time in five years, conflict has seriously destablised global markets. The effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz due to US and Israeli attacks on Iran has limited trade, causing skyrocketing prices - but not only for oil.

Most fertiliser production relies on liquefied natural gas (LNG). Gulf nations including Qatar and Saudi Arabia are major fertiliser producers, and one third of the world's seaborne fertiliser trade usually passes through the Strait, which is currently unavailable. Other fertiliser producing nations are reducing production due to limited gas supply. Are food shortages inevitable?

Alasdair is joined by Noah Gordon to discuss the international and environmental politics of fertilisers. They discuss fertiliser production, its uses and misuses, its role in global inequality and whether gas dependency can be avoided.

Noah Gordon is the acting Co-Director of the Sustainability, Climate and Geopolitics Programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C.

Further reading:

• 'The Other Global Crisis Stemming From the Strait of Hormuz’s Blockage', Emissary, March 2026
• 'A Trump Order Protected a Weedkiller. And Also a Weapon of War.' New York Times, March 2026
• How to Feed the World by Vaclav Smil, 2025
• 'How a few giant companies came to dominate global food', Land and Climate Review, May 2025
• 'Why was organic policy blamed for Sri Lanka’s financial crisis?' Land and Climate Review, June 2024
• 'Fertiliser emissions could be cut to ‘one-fifth of current levels’ by 2050', Carbon Brief, February 2023
• The Alchemy of Air by Thomas Hager, 2009
• Titans of Industrial Agriculture by Jennifer Clapp, 2025

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With the recent 'AI Boom', the energy demand of computing has risen dramatically. As generative artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots such as Chat GPT, Claude, Copilot and Grok become more mainstream, tech companies are racing to build and power new data centres - the physical 'computer factories' that store and process our information and online services.

This new infrastructure is significantly increasing greenhouse gas emissions - but tech companies argue that the climate innovations and efficiency improvements catalysed by AI tools will offset negative impacts. Could such claims prove true, or are they greenwashed PR?

Alasdair puts this question to writer and energy analyst Ketan Joshi, who recently authored a report on AI's climate impacts alongside several leading nonprofits.

Further reading:

• Read more from Ketan on climate and AI on his blog, here.
• 'Does Generative AI “Work”? That’s a Misleading Question.', Ketan Joshi, The New Republic, March 2026
• The AI Climate Hoax: Behind the Curtain of How Big Tech Greenwashes Impacts, Ketan Joshi, February 2026
• 'Crypto and AI exploit conflict zones and fossil fuels – with destructive consequences', Hito Steyerl, Gago Gagoshidze and Miloš Trakilović, Land and Climate Review, July 2025
• Empire of AI, Karen Hao, May 2025
• 'Big Tech’s green promises are hypocritical gestures', Nick Dyer-Witheford and Alessandra Mularoni, Land and Climate Review, April 2025
• SYSTEM OVERLOAD: How new data centres could throw Europe’s energy transition off course, Beyond Fossil Fuels, February 2025

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Climate change is making the lives of many more difficult. Tens of millions of people are already displaced by weather events each year, and studies show that climate breakdown drives mental and physical health crises, increased conflict, drought, and food insecurity, among many other challenges.

So why do leading climate models primarily measure impacts on Gross Domestic Product (GDP) rather than human wellbeing?

Inge Schrijver joins Alasdair on the podcast to discuss her new research into this question, and to explain how climate models work, how they are used, and what they are missing.

Inge Schrijver is a PhD researcher at the Institute of Environmental Sciences at Leiden University. Her study, “Inclusion of wellbeing impacts of climate change: a review of literature and integrated environment–society–economy models,” was co-authored with René Kleijn, Paul Behrens and Rutger Hoekstra, and is available to read here.

Further reading:

• ‘Climate action saves lives. So why do climate models ignore wellbeing?‘ Inge Schrijver, Paul Behrens and Rutger Hoekstra, The Conversation, 2025
• ‘Degrowth in the IPCC AR6 WGIII‘, Timothée Parrique, 2022
• ‘Sufficiency means degrowth‘, Timothée Parrique, 2022
• ‘Is climate modelling undermined by economics and ideology?‘, The Land & Climate Podcast, 2022
• ‘The appallingly bad neoclassical economics of climate change‘, Steve Keen, Globalizations, 2020
• WISE Horizons project

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